All Posts Tagged: fitness

The 7 Essential Stretches

1. Forward Fold

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How to: With legs straight, fold forward at the hip and try to touch fingertips to ground.What it stretches: Hamstrings and back of legs.The goal: You want your fingertips to graze the floor or be just around your ankles, Dragone says. If you’re not very flexible, bend knees to get your fingers to the ground and work toward straightening legs over time.

2. Side Stretch

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How to: With feet together, right hand at side, and left hand overhead, inhale deeply. Exhale as you bend to the right, allowing right hand to slide down outside of right thigh. Keep hips square (don’t stick out left hip) and do not tilt forward or back. Repeat on the other side.What it stretches: All of the muscles along your side, quadratus lumborum (part of your core muscles), and external obliques.The goal: Ideally, your right fingertips reach the outside of the right knee, Wu says, and same for the left side.

3. Seated Figure-4 Stretch

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How to: Sit on the edge of chair and cross right ankle to rest on left thigh. Gently press right knee toward ground so shin is parallel to floor. Repeat on the other side.What it stretches: The muscles around your hips: psoas, piriformis, other deep gluteal muscles, and even some of your hip extensors.The goal: Work to get your top shin parallel to the floor, Dragone says.

4. Thread-the-Needle Stretch

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How to: Start on all fours. Take right arm and thread through opening between left arm and left thigh. Allow upper torso to naturally rotate to the left and come to rest on back of right shoulder. You can modify this move by dropping your hips to your heels to feel an even deeper stretch.What it stretches: You’ll feel this all over your upper and middle back, plus in your shoulders. (It’s a great go-to after a stressful day sitting at a desk.)The goal: Try to get your shoulder to rest comfortably on the ground, opening up the entire upper back.

5. Cobra Pose

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How to: Lie facedown and place hands near shoulders, palms on the floor. Press up, extending arms fully, and allow back to naturally arch. Look straight ahead (not up) and maintain a level chin.What it stretches: Pectorals, shoulders, and neck.The goal: Aim to straighten arms without feeling compression in low back.

6. Half-Kneeling Triplanar Stretch

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How to: Place left knee and right foot on ground and set hands on right knee. (Grab a towel or some extra padding for your left knee if it’s more comfortable.) Shimmy left knee back a few inches and lean forward, ensuring right knee does not go over right toes. Try to make a straight line from left pelvis through left thigh and feel the stretch all along the front of your left leg and hip. Repeat on the other side.What it stretches: Hip flexors. (They’re a group of muscles that need extra love, since they’re often stuck in a bent sitting position all day and tend to tighten up after running or cycling.)The goal: You want to be able to fully extend your hip, creating a straight line from hip to thigh to knee.

7. Assisted Chest Stretch

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How to: Find a door or window frame, or the corner of a wall. Stand close to the edge of the frame with feet hip width and core engaged. Lightly hold the edge of the frame with left hand at shoulder height and rotate away from the frame to open the front of your chest.What it stretches: Pectorals, shoulders, and upper back.The goal: Try to rotate enough so that your arm is behind you. If you simply feel a stretch holding your arm out to your side, it’s likely that your pectorals are tight and overworked (possibly sitting all day with hunched posture). Focus on having better posture throughout the day, keeping shoulders pushed down and back. (Here’s how you should be sitting at your desk.)

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Children are just as likely to experience a sports injury as an adult. Whilst it is easy to take for granted the apparent flexibility of children as they appear to go from zero to 100 in a matter of seconds, it is important to develop a sense of importance and responsibility for the sport that they enjoy. This whole spectrum needs to be considered from warming up, to having a good sporting approach whilst playing to deciding whether to play at all.

Although physiotherapy is typically used to treat athletes and those who have suffered injury from an accident, it can actually provide relief to some of the most common aches and injuries. Physical therapy has proven to be an effective form of treatment for muscle pain, joint injuries, arthritis, mobility issues and even respiratory problems, like cystic fibrosis.

Effective Pain Relief
Many athletes and fitness enthusiasts develop pain in well worn joints and muscles as they age, and these problem areas can cause recurring injuries and difficulties. However, many people who don’t participate in sports or strenuous exercise can just as easily develop these aches and pains. For example, back pain is one of the most common injuries that people suffer from at some point in their life, and it affects about 80 per cent of the UK population. Physiotherapists will recommend stretches and exercises that target problem areas and offer relief, as well as administer massaging techniques that can help relieve pain and minimise the risk of further injury.

After all the fuss of the festivities, it is soon time to return to the normal world and of course, very importantly to set some goals for the year ahead. Whatever your aspirations are for this year, whether it is to eat healthier, get fitter or simply to self improve, it is important to have an end goal – or a motivator to help you to accomplish what you have in mind.

Our goal is your goal – a shared passion

In the world of physiotherapy, our yearly goal is a simple one – to spread the message about good health and ways to live a healthier, active lifestyle and most of all to be pain free. So what is there to look forward to in 2014 for those in pain? Same old same old you might be thinking, what’s to celebrate?

Actually there is a lot to celebrate, for physiotherapists dedicate their lives to ensuring people like you live in pain free live, and on those occasions when your body may need a little helping hand, then you know who to call upon.